CD Reviews

Wonderful old time music

07/15/1999

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I love this CD. Its simple, unadorned, yet somehow perfect. A number of these songs are still stuck in my head (in a good way). If you like old time American/bluegrassy music (or even think you might) you cannot go wrong with this CD. One of my favorites."

Getting Back to the Basics

dev1 | Baltimore | 06/21/2000

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I bought `While Passing Along This Way' because it has an interesting cover (goodness, no other serious music collector has ever did that before). Norman reminds me of Burl Ives after just getting off a farm tractor, and Nancy impresses me as a leftover hippie from the last millennium. There's no band, just Norman and Nancy singing and playing guitar, fiddle, cello and mandolin: strictly a voice and string project. The music is sparse with no post-production work (none that I can detect). Essentially, it's a `live' recording. Norman does most of the singing. His voice is plaintive, and occasionally he'll hit a sour note. Nancy provides suitable backup harmony vocals. `While Passing Along This Way' is sort of a country-hillbilly-bluegrass thing. Lots of I-love-Jesus stuff. It's very austere, rugged and unpolished.Nothing about `While Passing' is particularly noteworthy, except perhaps it's artistic integrity. That's a seldom heard quality where the artist's only motivation is the unbridled joy and satisfaction of `makin' music.' The Byrds tried to sound like this on `Sweetheart Of The Rodeo.' And Bruce Springsteen tried to sound like this on `Nebraska.' Billy Bragg and Wilco got very close on `Mermaid Avenue.' And Lucinda Williams nailed the sound on her self-titled commercial debut. Now that I think of it, those of some pretty impressive accolades."